The present invention relates to a thermal insulation element for thermally decoupling load-bearing building parts to be made from concrete, preferably between a vertical building part, particularly a support, and a horizontal building part located above or below thereof, particularly a ceiling or a floor.
In above-ground construction, frequently load-bearing building parts are made from reinforced concrete constructions. For energy-saving reasons, such building parts are generally provided with a thermal insulation applied at the outside. In particular the ceiling between the underground level, such as a basement or underground garage, and the ground floor is frequently equipped at the side of the underground level with a thermal insulation applied at said ceiling. Here, the difficulty is given in that the load-bearing building parts, on which the building rests such as supports and exterior walls, must be connected in a load-transferring fashion to the building parts located thereabove, particularly the ceiling. This is generally achieved such that the ceiling is connected in a monolithic fashion with continuous reinforcements to the load-bearing supports and the exterior walls. However, here heat bridges develop which can only be compensated with difficulty by a thermal insulation subsequently applied at the outside. In underground garages, for example frequently the upper sections of the load-bearing concrete supports, pointing towards the ceiling, are also coated with thermal insulation. This is not only expensive but also visually not very appealing, but it also yields to unsatisfactory results with regards to the physics of the construction and furthermore reduces the parking space available in the underground parking garage.
A brick-shaped wall element is described in DE 101 06 222 for thermally decoupling wall parts and floor or ceiling parts. The thermal insulation element has a compression-resistant support structure with insulating elements arranged in the interim spaces. The support structure may be made from light-weight concrete, for example. Such a thermal insulation element serves for the thermal insulation of masonry exterior walls, for example by using it like a conventional brick for the first layer of bricks of the load-bearing exterior wall above the basement ceiling.
A compression load-transferring and insulating connection element is known from EP 2 405 065, which can be used for the vertical, load-transferring connection of building parts to be made from concrete. It comprises an isolating body with one or more compression elements embedded therein. Lateral reinforcement elements extend through the compression elements to building parts to be erected from concrete abutting thereto essentially vertically beyond the top and the bottom of the insulation body. The isolation body can for example be made from cellular glass or expanded rigid polystyrene foam, and the compression elements from concrete, asbestos cement, or fibrous synthetic.
When installing such a prefabricated connection element the reinforcement elements must be embedded in concrete together with the abutting building parts. For this purpose, the connection element must be installed in a closed casing for the building part located underneath thereof and concrete must be cast from the bottom against existing, not accessible and not visible, bottom areas of the connection element. In particular in case of supports and exterior walls representing load-bearing building parts here an inappropriate execution during the construction of the building parts particularly at the connection site to the connection element can later lead to severe static problems for the building. Furthermore, here any control and monitoring of the execution is hardly possible. In particular, an inspection before and during the pouring of concrete is not possible due to the situation of the installation inside the casing. Any review of the finished building part is also hardly possible because the connection site between the building part and the connection element is not accessible.